Why do I keep making bottle bombs?

[Chris_B]

Somewhere in your bottling equipment, the nasties have a little clubhouse. And I bet it will be one of those 'obvious' places that you will kick yourself when you realize you have been overlooking it.

Are you disassembling ALL of you bottling equipment when sanitizing?

- Auto-siphon. Remove the tip and pull the plunger from the top. Clean all parts and soak in sanitizer before putting it back together.

- Bottling-bucket spigot. Mine is a plastic, threaded affair that you push through the hole in the bucket and tighten with plastic nut and rubber washers. Remove from bucket, take completely apart, clean and soak all pieces. Open and close the spigot several times in the solution to make sure all surfaces are exposed. Remember to check that it is in the closed position before mounting it back on the bucket - helps to reduce sticky floor syndrome!

- Pump sanitizer solution through your tubing to ensure the entire inside is sanitized. I use the auto-siphon to move several pumps of sanitizer through the tubing. If you just try to soak it in the sink, you will have air space trapped in the loops of the tubing.

- Bottling wand. Be sure you get sanitizer on the inside. Get some in the tube, then hold it up an operate the valve so solution flows through the valve. Work the valve several times under the solution.

- Remove any tubing attached to your siphon or bottling wand to clean where they a put together.

- Don't forget any miscellaneous equipment. Stirring spoon, the measuring cup you use to collect hydro samples, etc.

You might want to use PBW or other cleaner to soak your bucket for a day so just like you do a fermenter. Fermenters will build up a film that will be difficult to see and clean, so I clean mine every three or four brews. Bottling buckets shouldn't get that problem, but at this point, it can't hurt.

I know it sounds basic. But I bet is something that you just have gotten used to and need to look at again to 'see' it.

Good Luck!

 

[jjmeldrum]

Lol half way through this post I ran downstairs and checked to see if my bottles exploded. I almost started to re-wash my equipment. I started to inspect everything to see if I missed some spots cleaning....Thats funny, this post makes me second guess everything. LUCKY NO BOMBS HERE!!!

 

[rootbeerjohn]

Its either your fermentation time, infection, over priming ......OR we can face the truth and say that you have a haunted house. Poltergeist!

Or someone who doesn't want you drinking is sabotaging your operation. My wife did that to me she made my brew go bad (twice!).....she also always broke my hydrometers "while cleaning them for me". Now she isn't allowed to go in my brew room.

 

[fratermus]

In all 3 cases, I used the 5 oz. pack of priming sugar that came with the kit for my 5 gallon batch. Is it possible that this was too much?

Side note: 5oz is almost never the correct amount of sugar for carbonating a batch. The supply people package it that way because it is easier than giving you the amount that would likely get you correct-for-style (allowing for temp).

I would encourage all new brewers to look up:

* the CO2 volumes appropriate for the style
* the amount of priming sugar needed for that volume at a given temp

and then measure that amount out by weight.


The cause of the overcarb appears to be getting lots of good opinions, so I will stay out of that one.

 

[wondercow]

OP here. Wow, this thread has gotten really interesting (much more than I expected). I'm definitely starting to believe all this infection talk. The irony of my situation is that I work in a biology research lab where everyone does cell culture except for me, which has probably led me to be more casual about sanitation than I should be. All those jokes about sneezing on my coworkers' cells seem to be coming full circle...

Why don't you scrub your bottles with a brush? A brush costs around 2 Dollars and it takes no time at all.

It never occurred to me until now that rinsing, inspecting for visible debris, and Star-San might not be entirely sufficient. This step does seem pretty cheap and easy, and I'm a little embarrassed that it isn't already part of my bottling protocol.

Also, sanitizing the bottles in a wallpaper tray could be the problem, depending on how you're doing it. If you're not swirling the starsan around so it can coat for at least 30 seconds on all surfaces, then having a bottle laying on its side in the tray will cause an airbubble and thus no sanitizer in some places. I mix up a batch of starsan in my bottling bucket and 'sink' the bottles in it so they are completely full and submerged for about a minute.

I lay them on their side and fill them to the best of my ability, but there is always a tiny bubble left. I try to let it sit for about 30 seconds on one side and then rotate it 180 degrees so that everything touches Star-San, but it is entirely possible that I haven't been very thorough and missed some spots.

Some infections will result in a sour taste, some just kill the body.

A lot of the batch-mates of my bottle bombs would gush like crazy as soon as I opened them, then have almost no body/carbonation in the remaining beer that didn't go on the sink/counter/pants.

Somewhere in your bottling equipment, the nasties have a little clubhouse. And I bet it will be one of those 'obvious' places that you will kick yourself when you realize you have been overlooking it.

Are you disassembling ALL of you bottling equipment when sanitizing?
...
You might want to use PBW or other cleaner to soak your bucket for a day so just like you do a fermenter. Fermenters will build up a film that will be difficult to see and clean, so I clean mine every three or four brews. Bottling buckets shouldn't get that problem, but at this point, it can't hurt.

Since I had basically the same problem in 2, going on 3 beers, all bottled in a row, I think you are probably right that something is living in my equipment. I have always considered myself to be thorough about Star-San-ing everything and then rinsing after use, but obviously I need to really break it down and rethink things. The wallpaper tray works for much of my equipment, but the autosiphon is a couple inches too long even when unassembled, so I usually sanitize one end, then flip it to do the other end. It's possible that I'm missing part. I always submerge tubing in Star-San slowly so that it fills the hose and doesn't get bubbles in it, but I don't usually make the Star-San flow through it. It's just static in the hose.

Is there any advantage to using PBW over Star-San? I always assumed the no-rinse cleaners were superior due to their convenience, but do other cleaners do a better job of actually killing baddies?

 

[Zenman]

I have never bothered with gravity measurements

really need to start doing that, to completely eliminate the possibility that is is all the problem is.

As for the infection angle, you can just get a big plastic bin of some sort (I have a plain plastic file box) that you put 48 bottles or so in, fill with water & oxy clean, remove them 48 hours later and they will be cleaned. Still have to sanitize, but this will remove interior gunk with out the messy pain in the a** that a bottle brush is. I also do this to clean the auto siphon and other tubing, as well as sanitizer. Sanitizing doesn't equal clean, and clean doesn't equal sanitized. Need to do both phases to be sure

 

[double_e5]

uh i have not read any replies but this is the problem take the readings, your bottling before it is done fermenting and causing the bombs.

Maybe you should start reading the replies before posting.

 

[user 29674]

Is there any advantage to using PBW over Star-San? I always assumed the no-rinse cleaners were superior due to their convenience, but do other cleaners do a better job of actually killing baddies?

Starsan is a sanitizer, it doesn't clean. PBW is a cleaner, it doesn't sanitize. The idea is clean first with PBW, and then sanitize in Starsan.

 

[tmoney1224]

A lot of the batch-mates of my bottle bombs would gush like crazy as soon as I opened them, then have almost no body/carbonation in the remaining beer that didn't go on the sink/counter/pants.

I think this probably shows that it is an infection. As others have said I would either replace all the bottling equipment or try cleaning and bleach bombing everything. Could be your bottling bucket too, is it old and scratched up at all?

An oxyclean soak for all your bottles is definitely a good idea as well.

 

[Zenman]

Maybe you should start reading the replies before posting.

lol i edited that out right away, but seems you caught me

 

[HillbillyDeluxe]

I'm not worried about this at all...
My beer is never in bottles for 2 months

Here Here my good man!!! I keep a 6er of each batch for some time but the rest must die when palletable.

 

[dontman]

I've never had an infection, bottlebomb, or bottle brush. Can't imagine the tedium of brush scrubbing every bottle I ever bottled. That would be over 12,000 scrubbings. I would rather spend the $12 for new bottles than scrub each one. Rinse thoroughly after use, then vinator right before filling, yep, that's the ticket for me.

 

[EvilTOJ]

If it is an infection, I would start with a bleach holocaust, starting with all your plastic. I had to do that a few months ago because everything was souring and gushing. It actually turned out that it was the air in my crappy apartment that was souring everything, but I sterilized everything with bleach, even bought all new plastic everythings.

 

[Weezknight]

I have always considered myself to be thorough about Star-San-ing everything and then rinsing after use, but obviously I need to really break it down and rethink things.

Sorry for snipping out a lot, but I'm wondering how you meant this statement. Are you rinsing after using the StarSan, or after drinking the beer?

 

[FrankB]

Why I have not yet bottled my first batch yet, it is still sitting in the primary, from reading the posts I'd really don't think the treatment of the bottles would be the cause. As it sounds like a more prevasive symptom impacting all the bottles, nut just a few 'possibly dirty' bottles. I would guess the problem is in the bottling bucket, the hoses, or the bottling wand. As those are the items that are touching all the beer. Why I am sorry this has happened to you, I have really learned a lot of the 'what not to do' items for my first batch.

 

[wondercow]

If it is an infection, I would start with a bleach holocaust, starting with all your plastic. I had to do that a few months ago because everything was souring and gushing. It actually turned out that it was the air in my crappy apartment that was souring everything, but I sterilized everything with bleach, even bought all new plastic everythings.

Could you clarify about the air souring things? I rent an older house with some questionable mold/mildew history, and my roommate has two dogs who do a great job of making sure everything stays stirred up. How did you decide the air was the culprit?

Sorry for snipping out a lot, but I'm wondering how you meant this statement. Are you rinsing after using the StarSan, or after drinking the beer?

Rinsing after drinking the beer. Then the bottles go into storage in a cabinet until bottling day, when they get hit with Starsan and filled with new beer, no rinsing.